Our journey with IC

The one thing in my life that I never ever doubted was the fact that I wanted to be a mother, it was one of the main goals in my life. 

We got married in March 2015, after being together for 7 years we didn't wait to start our family. In October 2015 we found out I am pregnant! We were nervous but excited. We announced our pregnancy to our parents and we had our first scan at 7 weeks and went for our second scan at 11w + 5d. The baby was very active and healthy.

On 22 December 2015 I woke up again feeling unusual pressure and a drip, I jumped up and felt a gush of water flowing from me. I was uncertain what was happening but I had a suspicion I was busy losing our first baby. My husband (who was working the night shift at that time) came home and I told him what had happened, we went to the Gynecologist immediately and he confirmed our worst fear - my water had broken and there is nothing they can do to save our baby. I was 16 weeks pregnant. I went into labour and our first baby was born that afternoon. We did not know our baby's gender by the time of birth (we would have found out the gender the following week). We decided that we don't want to see our baby - my biggest regret in life. We asked to please just be told the gender of our baby. It was a girl! Elana was born weighing only 100g. The doctor mentioned very quickly that it might have been caused by an incompetent cervix but there is no way to know for sure and he also said it's unlikely because a woman with cervical incompetence tends to go into labour between 20 weeks and 24 weeks.

After months of struggling with my emotions and attempting to fall pregnant again, we found out we were pregnant again in September 2016. Our first scan was at 12 weeks, which is when my new Gynecologist confirmed that I do have an incompetent cervix, my cervix was already 0.8mm dilated at just 12 weeks. At 14 weeks my Doctor placed a McDonald cerclage in my cervix. I felt so positive that everything would be fine. At 17 weeks we found out we were expecting a baby boy! We were ecstatic. The day after my 27th birthday, feeling something didn't feel right we went to the Gynecologist to make sure that everything was fine.

 We got bad news, my cervix was funneling and our baby's head was almost again the stitch that was placed. I was placed on bed rest - 6 days later on 03 January 2017, I started getting contractions we went to the hospital where our Doctor was contacted, by the time the Doctor came I had started bleeding, after checking my cervix the Doctor explained that our baby's head is pushing against the stitch making it tear from my cervix. The stitch had to be cut which meant there would be nothing keeping our baby inside. 

Our baby boy, SG, was born a little while later weighing 400g. They asked whether we want to hold him I immediately said yes, even though we did not discuss the decision like the previous time. He was so small, when they put him on my chest his heart was still beating, I couldn't let him go. The nurse explained that his lungs are too small to insert tubes and he is unable to breathe on his own. Even though I knew all this it is hard to reason with a mourning mother. They had to give me something to make me sleep so they could take him away. 

I felt that I did not want to be pregnant again, my heart was shattered, I could not bear another loss. Nonetheless, I had a Shirodkar stitch placed a few months later only because I was scared that if we maybe got pregnant by accident we would have to go through everything again. 

Almost a year later in November 2017, after receiving very clear signs that we should try again, we decided to try one last time. I made it clear to my husband that if the third pregnancy results in a loss I'm done. I got pregnant again quite quickly, a few days after Christmas I found out I was pregnant. In July 2018, being 34 weeks pregnant, I gave birth to our happy healthy miracle rainbow girl.